


Sea Foam

by pawn_vs_player



Category: The Little Mermaid (1989), The Little Mermaid - All Media Types
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, Attempted Murder, Canon Rewrite, Canon-Typical Violence, Canonical Character Death, Dark Magic, F/M, Gen, POV Villain, Psychological Trauma, Revisionist Fairy Tale, Transformation, i don't like it very much but eh, i'm too lazy to go back and change it all now, the writing style is meant to imitate the original grimm style
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-11
Updated: 2018-01-11
Packaged: 2019-03-03 16:31:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,421
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13345089
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pawn_vs_player/pseuds/pawn_vs_player
Summary: Once upon a time, there was a princess of the land who fell in love with a man of the sea.Once upon a much later time, a princess of the sea fell in love with a man of the land and went to a witch to be with him.These two things are not as disconnected as you might think.





	Sea Foam

**Author's Note:**

> ,,,so,, yeah,, i rewrote the little mermaid from Ursula's pov. what can i say, i like twisted fairy tales!  
> i have like,, a lot more ideas for this kind of thing but this is the only one i finished so,,,, here y'all go,,, the third (and technically final) update of Exam Week 2018 is a story probs none of you will read that i'm not totally happy with  
> lol  
> i hope someone likes this, anyway

Once upon a time, there was a young princess. She lived in a castle atop a cliff overlooking the sea with her parents, the king and queen, and her three brothers.

One brother abdicated to experience the life of the poor; they received news, years later, that he had died, but his son - settled many towns over - had climbed into the clouds and battled giants for their treasure.

One brother went on a hunting trip in the woods; the princess ventured in one day, weeks after his disappearance, and met a great brown bear with the same eyes as her brother. He spoke to her, told her to leave him to his fate: she cried for him and stroked his muzzle, and then she picked up her skirts and went back to her castle.

The third brother, youngest but for the princess herself, was made heir to the throne. He did not leave the kingdom, instead growing into a strong man with wise blue eyes and sympathy in his heart. He was content with his lot, and vowed to be as great a king as his father when the time came.

His sister was less happy. She loved her brothers, and she mourned the loss of the eldest two. She longed for a life beyond the castle walls; she did not wish to die, like the eldest, or be transformed and cursed, like the second, but she wished for adventure.

She loved the sea beneath their castle. They had many fishermen, and they traded the goods of the sea with other kingdoms, for the ocean had blessed her kingdom. She spent long hours on the beaches, skin growing gold and firm, chestnut hair streaked cornsilk-pale with the sunlight. Her parents, while very protective given the loss of their elder sons, trusted their people to watch over their daughter while she was on the beaches.

One evening, the princess stayed on the beaches later than usual to watch the sun go down. The last of the fishermen wished her a good night and straggled off, leaving her alone on the sand.

Once the ocean had lost its pink and copper gilding from the sunset, the princess rose and brushed sand off her dress. She was about to leave, but she heard a splash, very close to where she stood, and instead of leaving, she turned around.

She was met with a pair of bright green eyes.

A man was in the water, covered up to his waist. He was staring at her as though he’d never before seen a woman, and she stared at him, as well, for he looked like no man she’d ever seen: his skin shimmered in the moonlight like the silvery scales of the fish she ate at dinner; he had slashes in the sides of his neck that did not bleed, but flapped like those of the fish the seamen brought in; his hair was long, and bound back from his face by a length of red seaweed.

She stepped closer to him, into the damp sand. The tide washed over her bare feet as she whispered, “Who are you?”

The man turned away, diving into the surf and disappearing.

The princess returned to the castle, resolving to come back and meet the mysterious man again.

The princess returned to the beach every evening, staying out after sundown, watching the moonlight dapple against the waves and waiting for the man to return. For three days, nothing happened. The princess told her parents and brother that she merely enjoyed looking at the waves at night, and that the view from her window was simply inferior.

On the fourth night, the princess stood and called out over the waves. She asked to be met, and if she was not, she would not return.

The man emerged from the waves. He came closer, but he was not walking: he struggled up close to her, and she saw that he had a scaled tail instead of legs, one that shone green in the moonlight.

“I am Nereus,” he said to the princess. “I am of the sea.”

She stepped closer, entranced. Water ran over her feet and legs; her dress grew damp, but she cared not.

She reached out to touch the merman, to confirm to herself that he was real. Her hand made contact with his cheek: it was cool and wet, and he smiled at her.

“I am Vanessa,” she told him. “I am princess of this land.”

“What would you do with me, princess Vanessa?” Nereus asked her.

She smiled at him gently. “I would ask to kiss you, if you are amenable.”

He kissed her. His arms were wet and strong around her waist.

Nereus and princess Vanessa met every four days under the moonlight. They talked and kissed and smiled, and slowly, the two grew closer. Vanessa’s heart grew faint whenever she left him, for she wished for them to never be parted; and on the third night of the third month of their acquaintance, she voiced her desires to him.

“I wish to stay with you,” Vanessa whispered, drawing patterns against her merman’s tail. “I wish to see your kingdom.”

“Only by magic could we remain together,” Nereus told her, “for I cannot walk and you cannot swim.”

Vanessa kissed him and stood, walking back to shore. “We shall see about that.”

There were many gifted with magic in Vanessa’s kingdom. Most were mere hedge-witches or healers, not able to do much but able to do something.

There were, however, those much more talented. Warlock Martin and Warlock Sage, for example, lived together in a tower in the far south. But Vanessa was not going to see the warlocks.

She was going to see a witch.

The most famous witch in Vanessa’s kingdom was one no one was entirely sure existed. They called her many names, but the most common was the ‘corner-witch’, for it was said she lurked in dark crannies and came out only when summoned.

Vanessa traveled to town, spending hours looking through shops but buying little. When the dying sun spread red and pink streaks across the sky, she slipped away from her guards down an alleyway and whispered into the wind, “Corner-witch, I summon thee.”

“What do you wish of me, child?”

An old woman stood at the other end of the alley, draped in black cloth and stooped over a stick. Her skin was blue as the sky, and her eyes were pink as roses.

“My heart is in the sea,” Vanessa replied. “I wish to join him.”

“It will not be easy,” the corner-witch warned. “You will be tested, and your love may fail. The sea is not kind to land-dwellers.”

Vanessa raised her chin. “I love him,” she said stubbornly. “I will be with him. I can withstand these tests.”

“So be it,” the corner-witch said, and raised her hand. “Join your heart, but if you fail, blame no one but yourself.”

Vanessa blinked, and in the space between opening and closing her eyes, she was on the beach under her castle, in the waves. Her skirt was in tatters, and her legs burned. She cried out as her legs fused together and grew a thick, sharp skin of scales, and as her neck split open to form the gills she needed to breathe. Her tail was black as the night sky on a moonless night, and Vanessa cried with the pain of it.

She crawled forward into the ocean on her hands, and when she finally submerged fully, she felt the touch of the waves as the glancing blows of frigid knives. But her love was before her, somewhere, and she must find him and join him.

Vanessa found her love, but she found him in a palace made of gold and pearl on the seafloor, hand-in-hand with another mermaid. They floated before a man with a long white beard and a crown- the Sea-King- and he pronounced them married forevermore.

Vanessa’s heart shattered, and she screamed at Nereus. She cursed him, cursed his heart to bleed whenever he looked at his new wife and for his tail to rot if ever he came close to Vanessa herself.

Then she swam away, sobbing, as the pieces of her broken heart reformed themselves into something much sharper.

Vanessa traveled far through the dark depths, searching for something she did not yet understand. She stayed so long in the dark that her lovely golden skin faded into white, and the grime in the water began to stain it green and gray. She was still inexperienced with her tail, so she traveled slowly, but she was determined to find something of worth in the sea she’d given her life up for.

Eventually, Vanessa found a grotto tucked into the side of an underwater mountain. The entrance was half-hidden by tall, waving plants she had never seen before, and an unnatural light shone from within. She peeked inside cautiously, curiosity getting the better of her.

There was a woman there, a mermaid- but instead of a fish tail, she had tentacles, like those of the octopus Vanessa’s brother once ate on his birthday, though the woman’s tentacles had barbs along with suckers. The woman turned to look at Vanessa: Vanessa put her hands up to show that she was unarmed, and asked the woman her name.

“They call me the Sea-Witch,” the woman said. “Who are you, and why do you come here?”

“I am Vanessa,” the mermaid replied, “and I am here because I have nowhere else to go.”

The Sea-Witch smiled at Vanessa. “Come in, child,” she said kindly. “You have a place here, should you want it.”

“I want it,” Vanessa said, and swam inside.

Vanessa’s heart had grown cold and dark, so the Sea-Witch taught her dark magics, the magic of the deal and the trick and the lie. She taught her how to always emerge victorious and how to play all those she met like puppets. Vanessa’s power grew and grew, and years passed in the dark grotto under the sea. The Sea-Witch grew older and taught Vanessa other things; the best manner of swimming, how to change one’s form with the least amount of pain, the traditions of the Sea-Witches who came before.

“Our name is Ursula,” the Sea-Witch told Vanessa. “I was not always the Sea-Witch, but I am now, and thus Ursula is my name until I die.” She patted Vanessa’s gray-skinned shoulder. “Should you take my place, it will be yours as well.”

Vanessa smiled at the Sea-Witch. “It is a good name,” she said.

The Sea-Witch and Vanessa often swam among the wrecked ships at the seafloor; they could gather valuable supplies there that they would not get anywhere else. As the years passed, Vanessa began going alone: she had grown confident in herself and her power.

She ventured out on one of these trips one day, a few hours after a severe storm. A ship had drifted down through the dark, angry waves, the edge of a cliff piercing the bow and holding it in place. She swam inside, looking for anything useful or interesting, and came face-to-face with a body.

She jerked back in surprise. The body was of a young woman, olive-skinned and flaxen-haired; her eyes were shut, mouth open. She wore a green dress that swirled around her legs in the current.

Vanessa bit her lip and reached out, brushing her fingers across the maiden’s icy cheek. Black sparks followed in their path.

“You are young, unfortunate one,” she whispered, and thought of the wind and currents, the crash of waves and the color of the ocean. “You have a life yet to live. Awake, poor soul, and regain the life stolen from you.”

The maiden’s eyes opened. Her mouth opened wide, perhaps to scream or perhaps to breathe: gills gashed open her neck and her legs simmered together, fusing into a silvery tail. The maiden put her hands to her neck, her mouth; she looked around and then at Vanessa, dark eyes questioning.

“Your ship capsized,” Vanessa explained calmly. “You died. I revived you.”

The woman flinched. “You are powerful indeed, madam.”

“Vanessa,” she corrected. “Would you like to stay with me?”

The woman considered it.

“Yes,” she said finally. “I am Morgana, and I thank you for your kindness.”

Vanessa’s smile was akin to the slash of a blade. “It was no trouble. I know quite a bit about lives cut short.”

She brought Morgana back to the Sea-Witch’s grotto, and the Sea-Witch welcomed the young mermaid with open arms. “She will be your trainee,” the Sea-Witch whispered to Vanessa, “to take your place when you follow me.”

Vanessa brushed her tail against the Sea-Witch’s tentacles. “We shall make you proud.”

“Of that, I have no doubt,” the Sea-Witch smiled.

The Sea-Witch grew steadily weaker, and she passed onward into the dark beyond ten years past Vanessa’s plunge into the depths. Vanessa held the Sea-Witch’s hand as the old mermaid breathed her last, and as she died, Vanessa’s own heart began to speed up. She gasped as the Sea-Witch’s corpse dissolved into sea foam, and cried out when the foam flew into her eyes: her heart grew heavy with power, and her black fishtail split into eight dark tentacles. Her brown hair bleached into ivory. Vanessa threw back her head, laughing at the surge of magic, as she became the Sea-Witch.

Morgana entered the death chamber cautiously. “My lady?”

“Ursula, child,” the Sea-Witch said, looking at her apprentice. “I am Ursula now.”

Many years passed in the grotto under the sea. Ursula taught Morgana all that her sea-mother had taught her, and she continued the legacy. When merpeople needed magic, they came to her, and she delivered- though she always claimed her price. She would give nothing away for free, not even advice or kindness. She cared not for altruism.

She found two baby eels and brought them back to her grotto. Morgana named them Flotsam and Jetsam, as they had been discovered in the wreck of a ship. Ursula kept them as pets instead of spell ingredients.

As the years stretched on, Ursula’s heart grew yet colder. The only beings she had any love for were her apprentice and her pets, and even with them, she was not kind. She treated everyone roughly and cared not for wounded hearts.

And then the youngest daughter of the Sea-King fell in love with a human.

The king was as stubborn and stone-blunt as ever. The little princess would never be allowed to follow her heart under his eyes.

And so the princess searched elsewhere, and as all desperate souls do, eventually she came down into the darkness to bargain for her desires.

“I love a human,” the little princess said, as blunt as her father. “Can you help me go to him?”

Ursula’s cold, cracked heart stirred. She thought of Vanessa, and she knew that she must do what the corner-witch had not. She must test this girl’s love, and the human’s love in return. She would accept nothing less than devotion from both parties to allow their relationship to flourish. No more girls would follow Vanessa’s footsteps.

Ursula sighed gently, the magic of the deal swirling faster in her heart. “Oh, of course, poor dear one,” she said, and began gathering ingredients. “Poor unfortunate soul,” she said, and gave the little princes the courtesan smile she’d perfected when she herself had legs. “But you must give me something in exchange.”

“I know,” the little princess replied. Her hair floated out around her face, a halo of fire. “The stories are very specific about that.”

Ursula laughed. “Clever girl,” she said. “Not quite so poor after all, are you?”

The princess did not reply.

“But then,” Ursula said, dropping ingredients into her cauldron and watching it glow and bubble, “love makes us all poor, and mad to boot.”

The princess’ eyes were fixed upon the cauldron. Ursula snapped her fingers; the contract popped into her hand, shimmering quill held carefully in two fingers of the other. “

Now, unfortunate one,” she said. The princess raised her gaze with effort, focusing on the magic paper. “I hereby agree to give you the means to win your heart, if you will swear to pay me the price I ask.”

The princess hesitated, and for a moment Ursula hoped. The little princess seemed smart, unafraid to speak her mind; perhaps she may yet avoid her fate?

“Give me the quill,” the princess said, and Ursula’s icy heart sank.

“Sign here,” she said, her voice steady. “Good.”

The quill and contract disappeared as soon as the princess finished her signature. The magic filled Ursula with bubbling heat and she roared with laughter, her cauldron surging and the princess cringing.

“As the sea flaps and crashes, so does your tail,” the Sea-Witch called. “As the earth scrapes and breaks, so shall your feet.” Her eyes were wild as she looked at the princess, full of white fire and green lightning. “Sing, dear one! Sing, and he shall be yours to claim!”

The princess sang. It was a lovely sound, clear as a bell and bright as gold.

Soon enough, the sound was swallowed by Ursula’s laughter. The princess clutched at her throat: the Sea-Witch clutched at the golden clamshell that still emitted muffled notes.

“You have three days to seek your heart,” Ursula called. “Good riddance to him if you fail!”

She waved her hand, and the princess thrashed as her tail began to split apart at the bottom. Ursula waved her hand once more, and the princess rocketed toward the surface of the ocean as her gills closed.

She didn’t want the girl dead, after all. It was only her suitor that needed to die.

Ursula gave the princess one day of solitude, one day of uninhibited time to catch her lover. On the dawn of the second morning, Ursula waved her hand to create a glittering bubble, in the surface of which she watched the mute little princess stumble into a dress and wait faithfully at the prince’s table for him to join her.

Ursula was surprised. The princess worked fast, apparently - or her suitor was just that biddable. If it was the latter…

Ursula smiled. Her white fangs glinted in the low light of her grotto.

If it was the latter, then perhaps Ursula could sway the deal in her favor and get the princess back into the ocean with her heart intact.

“Morgana!” she called. “Watch over the cave until I return. I have a price to collect.”

It was not exactly the truth, but Ursula had never claimed to be the Truth-Witch.

It was a simpler spell to turn Ursula human than it was to give the princess legs. The poor little princess had always been a mermaid; giving her legs and lungs and all the messy little land-dweller bits was like taking a doll and replacing half its parts without instructions.

Ursula, however, had once been Vanessa. All the Sea-Witch had to do was reach back to the dark-haired princess of years past and pull on the skin she had shed all those years past. It was like slipping into a familiar dress, old and worn but still comfortable, still the right size.

Vanessa surfaced beneath the cliffside. The castle had changed, but the beach was the same - though, it was noon, and all the fishing-boats were out on the waves, too far to see the woman suddenly appearing on the beach.

Vanessa tapped a long fingernail against the humming golden shell hanging round her neck. “With a voice so captivating as this,” she decided, “only the truest and strongest heart could resist.”

The princess slept in her little bed, and Vanessa visited the prince in his room. She hummed soft music to him and stroked his hair, and he turned his face into her touch and smiled. She smiled too, her magic wrapping as a net around the sleeping prince, the threads reaching through the castle to ensnare his staff.

Only the princess and her pets would know something had changed. Now to see if the princess believed her prince still loved her, or if she would turn back and return to the kingdom she belonged in. Her heart may break, but it would heal. She was young and alone in a strange place. It shouldn’t take much to send her back, cracked but alive. She would live on, as Vanessa had not.

Vanessa did not sleep beside her entranced prince that night. Instead, she wandered the halls of the castle, taking in what had changed and what had not. She knew not how long she had spent in the ocean, but only the architecture of the palace was familiar to her. Surely many generations had gone by. Perhaps the bloodline Vanessa hailed from was entirely gone now. Perhaps that would be for the best - only one brother had remained royal, and he was long dead. Who could say if his descendents were any good at ruling?

No, Vanessa decided. The prince caught in her web could not be of her brother’s line. His mind was far too easy to ensnare. No one of her brother’s blood would be so weak.

Besides, he looked nothing like any of the family Vanessa had known.

Dawn broke over Vanessa sitting at the breakfast table, looking at the waves. Perhaps land was her birthplace and two-legged her natural state, but the air was cold against her pale skin and she missed her eight prehensile limbs. Morgana had not woken her with a smile or story today, and whatever mischief Flotsam and Jetsam were getting into, she was not there to see.

It was no matter, Vanessa told herself. This was the dawn of the third day, the final day of the princess’ deal. The prince’s heart was Vanessa’s and so the princess would go home tonight, hurt but better for the lesson.

The prince fawned over her, paying her more attention than the wedding plans Vanessa had planted in his mind (what greater show of devotion was there, after all?). The red-haired princess, Vanessa noted, stood in corners with wet eyes and trembling lips.

Vanessa shot the princess a smug grin, but there was no joy in her heart. She was doing a job, nothing more. She had no desire for this weak-willed prince or his dry, windy kingdom. All she wanted was to send the princess home before the land caught her up in its claws.

So she endured the prince’s soft words and warm glances with only the merest of shudders. She parried his touches with words of propriety, replacing the disgust she truly felt. Vanessa belonged to no man, and never would.

The wedding was to be held on the grandest ship in the kingdom’s fleet, and the vows were meant to be completed as the sun went down. Ridiculously romantic, but it served Vanessa’s purposes. On sundown of the third day, the princess’ deal was off, and she’d be a daughter of the sea once more. Ursula would return and take the princess with her back into the waves. The spell on the prince would break, and the kingdom would return to normal. No permanent damage, other than perhaps to Ursula’s reputation as a heartless, merciless dealmaker. But she could make that back up easily enough. There are always hapless merfolk looking for help on the wrong side of the kelp.

The breezes on the ship were laden with the smell of salt. It soothed Vanessa’s harried nerves, allowing her to smile at the silly prince next to her. The priest who would read the vows was a short man whose glasses kept slipping down his nose. Vanessa tuned out his droning voice and the prince’s dull eyes by wondering if Morgana’s had to turn away any customers in her absence, and whether Flotsam or Jetsam had gotten into her stash of candied shrimp again.

The necklace around Vanessa’s neck was unnaturally warm, the faint hum of the princess’ voice keeping the prince nicely in line. A token of a bound heart’s true beloved always strengthened such a spell as Vanessa had caught the prince in.

The priest was winding down. The sun was sinking. Just a little more time, Vanessa reminded herself. Just a few more minutes, and she could go home and the princess would be safe.

“I do,” the prince said, and Vanessa’s hands shook.

The priest turned to her. She couldn’t hear his voice over the ringing in her ears. She’d thought the deal would come before this. She could not say it. She could not.

The priest’s mouth stopped moving. She stood, still and silent. The prince frowned at her. The priest looked concerned.

A bird landed on the priest’s tall, ridiculous hat.

Vanessa jerked back from it, startled. It was a mangy, ruffled thing, half its feathers out of place and long orange legs grimy. The priest shouted, hopping about and flapping his hands, but the bird was off his head nearly as soon as it landed. Instead, it flew at Vanessa.

On instinct, her hands went up to guard her head. That was her mistake.

The bird was not aiming for her head. It was aiming for her necklace.

The string holding the golden shell around her neck snapped as the bird pulled away. Vanessa gasped, reaching to grab the bird before it ruined everything, but it was faster than she. It swept away, to the cabin of the ship, and dropped the necklace to the deck.

Directly in front of the bare, scraped feet of the princess.

She met Vanessa’s eyes. Struck mute by the crumbling of her plan, Vanessa only shook her head, knowing the gesture was useless.

The princess slammed her heel down on the gold shell, not flinching as it cracked apart against her delicate skin.

The lovely, bewitching voice surged free of its prison, flowing back into the princess’ throat. She cried out for her prince, and Vanessa watched his eyes come alive.

He stumbled away from her, looking toward the princess.

All inconsequential. The deal wasn’t sealed yet.

Vanessa looked to the horizon, where the sun was a thin slice of molten gold. She smiled.

The princess could still be saved.

Vanessa raised her arms. The breeze picked up, a cold wind rustling the fancy clothes of the wedding party and the long hair away from Vanessa’s shoulders. She felt the sea, far beneath her feet, and thought of her grotto.

Vanessa’s skin tore apart like paper, fading into dust motes as Ursula ripped free, limbs sprawling across the deck. The people screamed and ran. The princess grabbed her prince’s arm and stared Ursula down.

“I won!” she yelled. “I won! Go away!”

Ursula cackled and slid toward the two of them. The prince stood strong with his love’s grip on him. Hmm. Perhaps Ursula had underestimated his devotion. Her magic was so terribly strong, after all.

“You haven’t sealed the deal, darling,” Ursula purred. “And look at the horizon.”

The last sliver of the sun disappearing under the waves was reflected in the princess’ horrified eyes.

“Sundown of the third day, poor dear,” Ursula cooed, one tentacle curling around the princess’ bare ankle. “And the deal unfulfilled.”

“No!” the princess screamed. The prince reached for her free hand, but she fell quicker than he could move, legs melting together and taking her whole body down to the deck. She flopped and gasped as her gills opened back up, causing her lungs to contend with a sudden new set of valves that didn’t work out of the water - a cruel sensation, Ursula knew, one that mimicked the sensation of drowning even as one kept breathing through their mouth or nose.

Ursula dragged the princess closer with the grip around her tail. “Goodbye, princey!” she yelled, laughing. “Love is a fickle mistress indeed!”

And she dove back into the ocean with the princess tangled in her coils.

The princess fought her, but she was young and single-tailed, disoriented and readjusting to life without legs. Ursula was the Sea-Witch. There was no fight the princess could win against her.

Morgana greeted Ursula at the entrance to the grotto, Flotsam and Jetsam curled around her arms. She said nothing; the weeping princess tangled in Ursula’s tentacles told the story without unnecessary chatter. Instead, she swept the kelp curtain back to allow Ursula and the princess entrance to her cavern.

“Hush, princess,” Ursula sighed, releasing her grip. Morgana closed the kelp curtain but remained in front of it, effectively guarding the princess’ only escape route.

“Why?” the princess whispered, curling in on herself.

Ursula crossed her arms. “I always carry through on my deals, princess. Isn’t that why you came to me?”

“No!” The princess’ eyes were a cold, cold blue. “You- this was a technicality! He loved me! And you interfered! You bewitched him! How was that fair?!”

“It wasn’t,” Ursula admitted calmly. Her deals were never kind and rarely fair. They were always in her favor. It was hardly her fault none of the merpeople knew how to haggle. “It wasn’t meant to be.”

The princess stared at her.

“Why so shocked? I’m the Sea-Witch, darling. You saw my garden outside. How many stories of the deals going as their makers expected have you heard?”

Shame flushed the princess’ pale cheeks as she ducked away from Ursula’s mocking gaze.

“Go home, princess. Live in your father’s court and find a nice merman to marry someday, or never marry at all - one of your sisters can take the throne, I’m sure.” Ursula shrugged, the motion carrying through her tentacles. “Never give your heart to a man of another world. Nothing good will come of it.”

The princess looked at Ursula with her mouth open, seemingly about to argue.

Then something impacted with the top of Ursula’s grotto and sent a shockwave through the rock.

Morgana darted outside. Ursula, with a final glance at the stony-faced princess, followed her apprentice. She’d told the girl to go home. There was no purpose to continue her imprisonment.

She began to reconsider when she saw the source of the shockwave.

The wedding ship - or another from the royal fleet, all ship bottoms looked the same - was floating right above them, and a volley of harpoons had just sunk into the top of her grotto.

“Morgana,” Ursula said, calm. “Take the eels and go.”

“What?”

“The Sea-Witch must live. The prince won’t stop until I’m dead or he is, and the princess will bring the wrath of the Sea-King down upon my head if I kill him. He has no quarrel with you. Go.”

Morgana gave her a silent, searching look. Ursula held firm. Her apprentice nodded, holding Flotsam and Jetsam against her chest, and swam swiftly away.

Ursula heard the princess come out of the cave behind her. “Your suitor has come for you,” she said, not looking back.

“He loves me,” the princess said.

“You’re certain?” Ursula prodded. “I did not lie, princess. Love between the land and the sea never lasts.”

The princess demanded, “How would you know?” She crossed her arms. Her hair floated out around her head like a scarlet halo.

“A long time ago,” Ursula said, turning away to watch another volley of harpoons slam into her home, “a princess of your heart’s kingdom fell in love with a man of the waves. She gave up her legs and her crown for him, but his heart belonged to another and he married her. The princess was left alone and forgotten.”

Ursula did not turn back to see the princess’ expression. It was a story she had never told another soul, and some details she would take to her grave. “If another princess is going to give her heart away,” she said, and allowed her magic to spark thick and black between her fingers, “I will make sure it is to a worthy man.”

She rocketed up to the surface, eight limbs propelling her far faster than a single-tailed mermaid could ever go. She burst through the waves and did not stop: her magic crackled like lightning under her skin, and she swelled larger and larger until she towered over the little ship bobbing in the waves, her limbs brushing the ocean floor and her hair parting the low-hanging stormclouds.

She recalled the old stories she’d read in her bedroom, about gods and mountains and thunderstorms. She laughed, the sound booming louder than a thunderclap. She raised her hand and drew her fingers through the clouds, gathering the electricity in her palm.

“HELLO, LITTLE PRINCE!” she called, and threw it.

The stern of the ship cracked right off, bobbing and sinking slowly in the churning waves. If there were any crewman on that ship, they didn’t stand a chance against the sea’s wrath.

She could still see a little figure dressed in white at the wheel. That wouldn’t last long.

Ursula plucked the prince right out of his ship with her tentacle, bringing him up to her face to see her target more clearly. If she was going to truly kill a man… well. Even a sandy-legged man like him deserved a witness, even if she was also his murderer.

He looked up at her. He had wide blue eyes that almost matched the princess’s, and the black of his hair almost matched the black of Ursula’s tentacles.

She felt, very suddenly, that this was a man who did not deserve to die.

The prince struggled and swatted at her, though it was obvious that he couldn’t kill her and if she dropped him, he’d likely die anyway. Certainly a tenacious one. 

“HEY!”

Ursula turned. The ship had drifted closer, tossed by the waves, and a familiar shape was flopped across the deck. Seems the princess had learned how to coordinate her two sets of respirators.

“Let him go!” the princess shouted. Her tail flapped weakly against the wooden boards of the deck, but she’d hauled herself up with a firm grip on the ship’s wheel to get a proper view of the Sea-Witch and her captive.

“AND WHY SHOULD I DO THAT?” Ursula asked, truly curious. Would the little princess truly put her life on the line for this prince? What had she seen in so little time to entrance her so?

“I love him!” the princess screamed. “And I don’t care if you think he’s not worthy, I do!”

Ursula paused, thinking. It was the princess’s heart, after all. It was her choice to make.

But… no. If someone else had seen Vanessa’s infatuation, if someone else had stepped in and saved her…

No. A mind in love was a mind clouded. The princess couldn’t be trusted to make her own decisions about this prince.

“OH, LITTLE PRINCESS,” Ursula said. “IF ONLY YOU COULD PROVE IT.”

The prince looked Ursula directly in her massive eye and said, almost inaudible over the winds, “Who are you to say I don’t love her?”

Ursula looked right back. “THE PROOF.”

She loosened her grip on him, wanting to watch his fear as he dropped. Sure enough, as the only thing keeping him from falling to his death began to give way, he started vainly clutching at the smooth surface of her tentacle despite his hatred for her.

She laughed. “GO AHEAD, LITTLE PRINCE. IT WON’T SAVE YOU.”

The prince’s eyes were very wide. Ursula could see herself in them, her shock of pale hair and her glittering sharp teeth and the lightning crackling around her head.

“No,” he said, fingers relaxing. “But she will.”

Ursula frowned in confusion for a moment. Then his meaning hit her - literally.

The ship’s broken, sharp bow rammed into her side, digging through her flesh and burying itself in her guts. She felt bone snap against the heavy wood, and felt the pulse of her heart pushing blood out of the gaping hole in her side.

She dropped the prince.

He fell, but not to the sea. He bounced off her tentacle and slid down the curling mess of her limbs, dropping into the roiling waves with only bruises.

The princess cried his name and dove off the ship after him.

Left alone, Ursula gasped. She could already feel herself fading, the blood bubbling from her wound turning to foam as soon as it left her body.

“Morgana,” she whispered.

She pushed feebly away from the ship. Already damaged, the bow broke from the rest of the ship and remained stuck inside her.

Ursula fell. The waves roared back from her impact, and she looked dully up at the sky as her body continued to dissolve.

The clouds were thick and gray. She could still see the lightning crackling, waiting to be unleashed.

She closed her eyes and let the sea claim her.

A good distance away, hiding in the thick kelp gardens by the Sea-King’s palace, Morgana gasped and shook as a sudden, burning rush of power lit her up from the inside. Her silver tail split and her eyes glowed. Flotsam and Jetsam moved away from their new mistress, wary.

She calmed, and reached out for them again. “It’s alright,” she said. “I am Ursula. You know me.”

The eels accompanied Ursula to her hidden watching-place a week later, where they spied upon Ariel, princess of the sea, receiving her father’s blessing and running into her prince’s arms.

Ursula climbed the hull of the rebuilt flagship to observe the wedding of Ariel and Prince Eric. Their eyes hardly left the other, and they smiled with no trace of falsehood.

It would seem her predecessor was wrong about this prince.

Ursula took up the mantle of Sea-Witch, as she had promised. She made fair deals and did not lie to her customers about their chances.

Times changed, and so the Sea-Witch changed with them.

Ariel and Prince Eric had several children and lived a happy life in their kingdom, ruling their lands and keeping up diplomatic relations with the Sea-King next door. The kingdom flourished under their rule, and continued to flourish when they left the throne to their youngest, Melody - their only choice of heir, after their elder sons and other daughter had all gone off on adventures to other kingdoms. 

And the Sea-Witch lived on under the waves, the title and magic switching hands for-ever after.

 


End file.
